Georgia’s Guardsmen are often called upon to lend their voices to a public cause or special event.  Just as the experiences of Citizen-Soldiers uniquely position them to fill leadership roles in their civilian capacities, so too are these minutemen of the modern era looked to for their leadership through rhetoric.

From promotion and retirement ceremonies to funerals, from send-off ceremonies to welcome home celebrations, from flag dedications to addresses on the Capitol floor, Georgia’s Citizen-Soldiers are looked to time and again to form and deliver cohesive and thoughtful speeches – and each audience requires different considerations.

If you’re a Guardsman looking to deliver a speech, here are some handy resources you might find useful:

·  Ten tips for public speaking

·  Using Rhetorical Strategies for Persuasion

· Three ways to use your fear of public speaking to make you a better public speaker

You might also want to take a look at some of Georgia Department of Defense 2010 annual report as a resource.

We’ve provided a few speech outlines for annual holidays and recurring special events.  Feel free to take from these outlines what you will.  What’s important is that you integrate your personal experiences into your speech – that’s what people want to hear!

HERE is a collection of several exemplary speeches delivered by various leadership throughout the Georgia Department of Defense.  This collection offers a good sense of the wide scope and breadth of content addressed in the speeches of our organization’s leaders.

We’ve also prepared some generic Power Point Presentations which you can use as visual aids for explaining what the Georgia Guard does in its many capacities for the State and Nation: